1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to automated systems for processing documents and the like, and more particularly, to an automated system for the high speed processing of gaming documents such as betting slips, lottery tickets or the like, containing a printed dollar value and a bar-code validation number, using an automated apparatus of the type disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,626,298, which has been modified to process gaming documents in an accurate, efficient, versatile and high speed manner without the necessity of forwarding the validation number to a remote location for identifying the dollar value of the betting document.
The apparatus disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,626,298 is designed for high speed automated processing of currency bills. It utilizes an improved mechanical transport system, multiple scanning devices for information reading and sophisticated digital signal processing. It employs parallel 32-bit data processing units for increased speed. An 8-bit control circuit tracks the currency bills as they move through the apparatus, accurately regulates transport motor speed and operates the collection bin gates. That patent is incorporated herein by reference. The reader is referred to that patent for detailed information as to the operation of the apparatus disclosed therein.
Other automated currency processing machines are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,459,806 entitled “Method and Apparatus for Currency Discrimination and Counting” issued Oct. 1, 2002 to Raterman et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 6,748,101 entitled “Automatic Currency Processing System” issued Jun. 8, 2004 to Jones and U.S. Pat. No. 6,843,418 entitled “System and Method for Processing Currancy Bills and Documents Bearing Barcodes in a Document Processing Device” issued Jan. 18, 2005 to Jones, all assigned to Cummin-Allison Corp. of Mt. Prospect, Ill.
Race tracks and other types of gaming establishments utilize large numbers of paper documents such as betting slips which must be read and the read data converted for display, validation, manipulation and storage. While those tasks can be done manually, manual handling and copying of such documents is time consuming, labor intensive and may result in inaccuracies.
Clearly, there is a need for a system of performing those functions with an automated apparatus that can be connected directly to a computer. However, to be commercially successful, the apparatus upon which the processing is performed must be able to reliably scan the printed side of the document, read the information printed thereon, ascertain the dollar value of the gaming document and convert the scanned information into a format where it can be displayed, validated, manipulated and stored on a computer. The processing must be able to be executed on an apparatus capable of performing all of those functions in a high speed manner.
Further, for audit purposes, many casinos in the United States are required to store their slot tickets from six months to three years, depending upon the jurisdiction. Due to the large quantity of tickets involved, this creates tremendous warehousing problems.
There are automated betting document processing systems available but they operate by reading the bar-coded validation number and using that number to access a remote database to ascertain the dollar value printed on the document. They are not capable of creating a high resolution image of the betting document, accurately ascertaining the dollar value from the image and processing the information obtained in an efficient and high speed manner. Nor are they able to compress the image and download the compressed image to a remote optical drive for long term storage.
It is, therefore, a prime object of the present invention to provide a system for high speed processing of gaming documents without the necessity of forwarding the validation number to a remote location to obtain the dollar value of the gaming document.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a system of high speed processing of gaming documents that can be preformed on fully automated apparatus capable of scanning the printed side of the document to create an image, locating and accurately reading the dollar value information from the image and converting same into a format for display, validation, manipulation and/or storage on a computer in an efficient and high speed manner.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a system of high speed processing of gaming documents which can process documents whether they are oriented right side up or upside down.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a system of high speed processing of gaming documents capable of identifying the dollar value printed on the document using optical character recognition and then converting same to an ASCII format through the use of templates which are compared to each of the characters.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a system of high speed processing of gaming documents capable of creating a high resolution image of the document, compressing storing the image and downloading the compressed image to a remote optical drive for long term storage.
2. Description of Prior Art
To the best of applicant's knowledge, there is no automated system of processing gaming documents in a high speed accurate manner that operates without having to access a remote database to ascertain the dollar value of the gaming document using the read bar-code validation number. In particular, there is no processing system that is capable of capturing a high resolution image of the printed side of the gaming document, locating the printed dollar value on the image, and identifying the dollar value using optical character recognition in order to convert the data into ASCII format for display, validation and/or manipulation using a plurality of templates to identify the individual characters.
Further, there is no automated gaming document processing system which compresses a high resolution scanned image of the document and stores the compressed image on a local hard drive for downloading to a remote optical drive for long term storage.